 Hi, welcome to In the World of Winooski. I'm Mayor Lott joined today by our deputy mayor, Thomas Renner, who is gonna discuss with us the 2023 Winooski Pride event scheduled for Saturday, September 9th, 2023 from 3.30 to 7.30 p.m. This is our second annual Pride event and we are lucky to have Thomas here who's been involved in the planning. Welcome, Thomas. Hey, thanks, Christine. Thanks for having me in the world of Winooski today. Very exciting. I know you and some of our other city counselors are involved in the planning process. Before we dive into that, this is our second event. Can you tell us a little bit about last year's Pride in Winooski? So last year's our first event that we'd ever done and it kind of blew expectations right out of the water. The event was super well attended. We had performances from Drag Queens doing story hour with kids that was really well received. We had some performances. We had some dancing. It was a really, really great event and we just knew that we had to do it again. Yeah, and can you tell us, I heard good things about last year looking forward to the second round. Can you tell us a little bit about this year, what folks can expect, what might be the same or different? Yeah, so we're gonna have those same performances. We're gonna have a great story hour. There might be some changes to it this year that I'll leave for folks to find out when they come. We've got DJ Gaybar who's gonna be coming to do music throughout the evening. And then what's a little bit different about this year is the businesses that surround the circle are all gonna be hosting some sort of event after Pride is done in the Rotary. Oh, so Saturday night? Yes, exactly. So the party's not gonna stop in the Rotary. There's gonna be events for people to go out to and enjoy at our Winooski businesses. What are you most excited about? I think I am most excited about to see what those individual businesses are gonna come together with. We are encouraging folks to decorate their windows or decorate their spaces, come up with meals or drinks that are specific for the event. So I'm really excited to see what those entrepreneurs come up with. Speaking of that, it feels to me like we have pretty strong LGBTQ plus representation in the business community in Winooski. Do you wanna give a shout out to any of those businesses that have been involved in the planning process? Yeah, sure. So Waterworks has been great. They are our main sponsor at the moment. So a big shout out to them. Without them we wouldn't be doing and putting together everything that we are. And then we have our city council members who have been really influential and cross the LGBTQI spectrum. So it's been great to have their input as well as representative Taylor Small who represents us in the state house. And then all of the businesses, downtown Winooski has really rallied all of their core members to help us plan this year. That's awesome to see so many people coming together. And also, as you mentioned, so many of our local representatives are a member of the community. And it's really wonderful to see, we think of Winooski as a welcoming place, but a place where folks who identify this way feel like they can be engaged. I feel like there is a very strong LGBTQ plus community here. And I wonder if you could speak a little bit to what it means for you to be hosting, helping to host Pride in Winooski and to be a part of that group. Yeah, that's a great question because it means a lot, one that folks are putting their trust in myself and other members of council to create an event for the entire community and not just our community in Winooski, but our community throughout the area who will come and attend. And the great thing about Winooski Pride and most Pride celebrations is it's not just for people who are in the LGBTQIA plus community, it's for everybody. And we definitely saw that last year and we're really hoping to see it again this year. It's really, I love a lot of parts of my job as deputy mayor, but being able to plan and mold this event is really, really important to me. Yeah, sometimes we think about our elected officials in a very formal policy setting mode, which is definitely part of the job, but community engagement is also so important in the work that we do. Yeah, it's one of the most fulfilling parts. And as you mentioned, this is a family-friendly, all-inclusive event. Everybody is welcome. It's hosted in the Rotary. Is there anything else happening beyond the sort of downtown area? As of right now, no. It's just everything will be in the Rotary and just those surrounding businesses, but there are gonna be events that we specifically plan for kids. So we'll have people blowing bubbles, we'll have people doing face painting and other activities like that. There are meant for families and children. Food and drink, I assume? There will be food and drink. There will be drink right in the Rotary, and then the food will be provided from all of our wonderful businesses around the Rotary. All right, and is this in partnership with Downtown Winooski, like some of our other events? Yes, this is in partnership with Downtown Winooski. They have been really crucial in helping to plan this and leading the charge forward. That's excellent. Are there any volunteer opportunities remaining? Yes, there are. So you can go to downtownwinooski.org. You'll see the Pride banner and you can click on there, and that will give you all of the information to volunteer. We need folks who can help decorate, folks on the day of to do crossing guard duties. There's a plethora of activities that people can take part in. Lots of opportunities. And I wonder if folks wanna be more involved next year, obviously they can reach out to you or any of us in Downtown Winooski. Is there, how early does the planning begin for this sort of event? Yeah, so we would like for the planning to begin about a year out if we had some amazing volunteers that would make that a lot easier to do. That's great. Are there any other highlights or specific pieces of the event activities you wanna highlight? We're gonna get some really interesting performers to come in this year. Last year we had dry queens and they will be coming back, but we're gonna have some more quirky and interesting things coming in. I'm really excited for y'all to see. So a slate of performers on the day of. Again, that is Saturday, September 9th from 3.30 to 7.30 p.m. in Rotary Park, as well as in the businesses surrounding the area. Oh, I see on here we've got some bingo karaoke and some vendors. This is excellent. Oh, fantastic, look at that. Yeah, this is the website downtownwanewski.org and I believe the email address is, oh shoot, I don't have it written down. And you can go to downtownwanewski.org though and oh, here we go, Melissa at downtownwanewski.org. This is who you can reach out to. Yes, please. Or either of us. Or either of us, yeah. I am KLOTT at wanewskivt.gov. And I am T, runner, R-E-N-N-E-R at wanewski.gov. With that, is there anything else that you wanna share with us about Winooski Pride? I think we covered it all, but we're just really excited for everybody to come out and enjoy the day. Excellent, thank you so much for joining me. And thank you for tuning in to this month's In the World of Winooski. We hope to see you on Saturday the 9th in the Rotary Park for Winooski's Pride event. All are welcome.